Category: Blog

First things first…What is Lupus? I know when my family physician told me she thought I may have Lupus, my first reaction was, “what in the world is that?”. Knowing me as well as she did, her simple answer was, “an autoimmune disease, stop at the book store on your way home so you can research it.” Of course she was absolutely right, the first place I went was the book store. This is what I learned…

Lupus is a multi-system, autoimmune, inflammatory, viral disease effecting between 1.5 and 2 million Americans, most are women between 15 and 45 and 80% of them are African American, Asian, and Hispanic. In Lupus the immune system can’t tell the difference between viruses, germs and bacteria and your body’s own healthy tissue. This leads the immune system creating antibodies that attack and destroy healthy tissue, therefore leading to inflammation, pain and damage any/or all body parts. Lupus is characterized by flares, where symptoms worsen, and then goes into remissions, when symptoms improve.

Flu season in the United States typically peaks in February, but this year’s outbreak is already one of the worst on record. As of Jan. 6, 20 children have died of influenza, and mortality caused by the flu is already double last year’s.

One reason the flu is so severe this season is the dominant strain is H3N2, which has an impressive ability to mutate and is particularly aggressive against Americans over 50. Cold and Flu Natural Remedies

Making the threat worse is how most of the IV saline bags used in common medical treatments and procedures — including severe cases of the flu — are made in Puerto Rico, still reeling from Hurricane Maria.

Hospitals in some areas around the country that are operating at or above capacity due to the flu are quickly running low on saline, resorting to time-consuming and potentially dangerous treatments of patients.

The only thing worse than getting the flu is catching it after you’ve gotten a flu shot. It’s been a terrible year for outbreaks — the worst in almost a decade. Contributing to that is the high failure rate of this year’s flu shot. The shot was just 25% effective against the H3N2 virus, this season’s most-often-identified strain by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The experts say, with enough time and money, they can do a lot better.

Drug companies and public-health agencies are already grappling with the challenge of next year and beyond. Officials must decide several months ahead of flu season the make-up of the year’s vaccine. Flu shots are typically 40-60% effective in any given season, though this year fell far short of that mark. Their ultimate goal is a universal vaccine that would operate more like a measles shot than a vaccine targeted at a handful of strains of flu. The idea is to offer something closer to 90% protection against a disease for years — if not for life — with a single shot.

If you have Fibromyalgia, you know it! If you don’t have it you probably know someone who does or you have at least heard of it. If you are like me, some people in your life believe you and are supportive, some have no idea what Fibromyalgia is and want more information, some have seen the commercials that say, “I took this pill and now my life is back to normal”, that’s inevitably followed by, “why don’t you get your doctor to give you that?”. There are the ones who think it’s all in your head and are quick to advise you, “if you would just get out more”, “you just need a job, so you don’t have so much time to focus on yourself”, or “if you would just exercise, eat right, loss weight, or so on and so on! We spend almost all our time educating; ourselves, our doctors, and others and it’s exhausting! It’s not a wonder with all that explaining and educating we have no energy left for anything else. So I want to encourage you to stop trying to explain and educate, refer all those “well wishers” to sites like this for education, and start taking care of YOU!

What is Cerebral Palsy?

Rather than being a single condition, cerebral palsy is the name of a group that includes several disorders. These conditions affect a person’s overall balance, mobility and muscle tone to varying degrees. The conditions get the umbrella term because they begin in the brain and are thus cerebral, and have an impact on muscle control, a form of palsy. Most people who live with cerebral palsy are born with it as the part of the brain responsible for muscle control is damaged or doesn’t develop as it should. In some cases, a person might show signs of it sometime later. Cerebral palsy includes varying degrees of severity, and it can affect a child’s movement so that walking or changing positions is difficult.